Intel Core Ultra 5 245K review

Our VerdictThe Core Ultra 5 245K falls short in gaming, compared to the competition and previous generation of Intel chips, but if content creation and low energy consumption are important to you, then the little Arrow Lake is worth a look.

Our Verdict

The Core Ultra 5 245K falls short in gaming, compared to the competition and previous generation of Intel chips, but if content creation and low energy consumption are important to you, then the little Arrow Lake is worth a look.

ForVery low power consumption in gamesPretty good for content creationAgainstSlower in games than Raptor Lake and Zen 5Not many cheap Z890 motherboards

ForVery low power consumption in gamesPretty good for content creation

AgainstSlower in games than Raptor Lake and Zen 5Not many cheap Z890 motherboards

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Jump to:Gaming performanceContent creation performanceConclusion

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Intel Core Ultra 5 245K…

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That’s not the only change on show here and we’vecovered the important changes in detailelsewhere. It’s suffice to say that the new Core Ultra 200S series of CPUs is a new world for Intel as they are so different to previous desktop designs.

While it’s an obvious successor to theCore i5 14600K, the 245K’s $309 MSRP puts it closer to theRyzen 7 9700Xthan theRyzen 5 9600X(currently $249 and $327 on Amazon, respectively). Architecturally, though, it’s very different to both as AMD’s chips are six/eight-core processors, with support for 16 threads, whereas the Arrow Lake chip has 14 cores, 14 threads.

One further processor that the Core Ultra 5 245K is close to price-wise is theCore i7 14700K. That 20-core chip can be picked for around $50 more than the new Arrow Lake, just 14% more expensive but with twice as many threads on offer.

Gaming performance

Whether any of these processors are worth buying naturally depends almost entirely on how well they perform in a variety of scenarios, so let’s begin with an examination of the Core Ultra 5 245’s gaming chops, tested at 1080p with aGeForce RTX 4070graphics card.

If you’ve already seen the gaming results for theCore Ultra 9 285K, then the above figures shouldn’t come as any surprise. While the 245K is on par with the 14600K in Homeworld 3 and Metro Exodus, it is noticeably worse in all the other game tests—15% slower in Cyberpunk 2077 and Warhammer 3, and 12% slower in Baldur’s Gate 3.

Core Ultra 5 245K specs(Image credit: Future)Cores (P+E):6+8Threads:14Base clock:4.2 GHz (P-core)Boost clock:5.2 GHz (P-core)L3 Cache:24 MBL2 Cache:26 MB (Total)Unlocked:YesMax usable PCIe lanes:24Graphics:Intel Graphics (4 Xe cores)Memory support (up to):DDR5-6400Processor Base Power (W):125Maximum Package Power (W):159Recommended customer price:$309/£279

Core Ultra 5 245K specs

(Image credit: Future)Cores (P+E):6+8Threads:14Base clock:4.2 GHz (P-core)Boost clock:5.2 GHz (P-core)L3 Cache:24 MBL2 Cache:26 MB (Total)Unlocked:YesMax usable PCIe lanes:24Graphics:Intel Graphics (4 Xe cores)Memory support (up to):DDR5-6400Processor Base Power (W):125Maximum Package Power (W):159Recommended customer price:$309/£279

(Image credit: Future)

A photo of an Intel Core Ultra 5 245K processor against a dark background

Cores (P+E):6+8Threads:14Base clock:4.2 GHz (P-core)Boost clock:5.2 GHz (P-core)L3 Cache:24 MBL2 Cache:26 MB (Total)Unlocked:YesMax usable PCIe lanes:24Graphics:Intel Graphics (4 Xe cores)Memory support (up to):DDR5-6400Processor Base Power (W):125Maximum Package Power (W):159Recommended customer price:$309/£279

The Factorio test, which is an excellent judge of L3 cache performance, runs 22% slower on the 245K than the 14600K. And it’s even worse when compared to theRyzen7 9700X, where the 245K takes 40% longer to process the updates than the Zen 5 chip.

In fact, the CPU with the closest matching performance is the Ryzen 5 7600X, a processor that has fewer cores and threads, lower clocks, and launched over two years ago.

In previous architectures, like Raptor Lake and Alder Lake, great gaming performance came at a cost of very high power consumption, and this was an aspect that AMD easily had the measure of Intel in. Arrow Lake doesn’t completely counter the power advantages that Zen 4 and 5 have, but it’s a big step in the right direction.

And there is something else that the little Arrow Lake is good at.

Content creation performance

Recent updates

If you use your PC for nothing but gaming, then it’s very obvious what the final conclusion in this review of the Core Ultra 5 245K is going to be. On the other hand, if you do 3D rendering, design work, video editing, and so on then you’re in for a pleasant surprise.

Where it’s not so good is in 7zip decompression—better than Zen 5 but worse than Raptor Lake. That’s probably because the ring bus that transfers all the data between the L3 cache and memory controllers runs much slower in Arrow Lake than it does in the previous architecture, and the data has to be transferred to another tile before it can be sent to DRAM.

(Image credit: Future)

A photo of an Intel Core Ultra 5 245K processor against a dark background

PCG test rigMotherboard:Asus ROG Maximus Z890 HeroCooler:Asus ROG Ryujin III 360 ARGB ExtremeRAM:32 GB Lexar Thor OC DDR5-6000Storage:2 TB Corsair MP700PSU:MSI MAG AB50GL 850 WOS:Windows 11 Pro 24H2Chassis:Open platform w/ 3x 140 mm fansMonitor:Acer XB280HK

PCG test rig

Motherboard:Asus ROG Maximus Z890 HeroCooler:Asus ROG Ryujin III 360 ARGB ExtremeRAM:32 GB Lexar Thor OC DDR5-6000Storage:2 TB Corsair MP700PSU:MSI MAG AB50GL 850 WOS:Windows 11 Pro 24H2Chassis:Open platform w/ 3x 140 mm fansMonitor:Acer XB280HK

Speaking of memory, Core Ultra 200S processors support up to DDR5-6400 natively but you gain very little performance over DDR5-6000. Only when you step up to the likes of DDR5-7800 do you see any notable gains, though not in any of the content creation tests, other than 7zip compression (which involves a lot of memory writes).

While Arrow Lake has a significant power consumption advantage in gaming, the multi-tile chip demands a lot more energy when processing heavily multithreaded tasks. That said, where the 14600K and 14700K will bounce off their maximum power limits in such scenarios, the Core Ultra 5 245K never does, staying 20 W under the 159 W cap at all times.

Conclusion

Summarising the relative merits of the Core Ultra 5 245K, compared to the 14600K, is a straightforward affair. Gaming is poor, content creation is good, and power consumption is great. But Intel isn’t the only company making desktop CPUs and the summary also applies when comparing the 245K to the Ryzen 5 9600X and Ryzen 7 9700X.

Buy if…✅ You want a budget productivity CPU:The Ultra 5 245K is much better than the i5 14600K in content creation workloads.

Buy if…

✅ You want a budget productivity CPU:The Ultra 5 245K is much better than the i5 14600K in content creation workloads.

Don’t buy if…❌ You want a budget gaming CPU:Stick to Raptor Lake or AMD Zen 5 if you want the best frame rates.

Don’t buy if…

❌ You want a budget gaming CPU:Stick to Raptor Lake or AMD Zen 5 if you want the best frame rates.

The Core Ultra 5 245K isn’t as disappointing as the Core Ultra 9 285K, but unless one specifically needs an affordable processor purely for content creation tasks or a low-power chip for an SFF build, there’s little to attract one to the Arrow Lake chip.

And while Intel is adamant thatRaptor Lake’s voltage problemhas been fixed, they’re somewhat hard to recommend too, even though they’re much better in gaming than the 245K.

That’s simply because the Ryzen 5 9600X is cheaper and performs really well in games. If content creation is important, then the Ryzen 7 9700X is on par with the 245K and only a few dollars more expensive.

Intel’s Core Ultra 200S series aren’tbadprocessors, and the Ultra 5 245K is perhaps the best of the lot right now, but there are much better gaming CPUs on the market for the same money—from AMDandIntel.

Intel Core Ultra 5 245K: Price Comparison

$319.99View$328.99ViewNo price informationCheck Amazon

$319.99View

Intel Core Ultra 5 245K…

Best Buy

$319.99View

$319.99

$328.99View

Intel Core Ultra 5 245K

Newegg

$328.99View

$328.99

No price informationCheck Amazon

Amazon

No price informationCheck Amazon

No price information

We check over 250 million products every day for the best prices

The Verdict70Read our review policyIntel Core Ultra 5 245KThe Core Ultra 5 245K falls short in gaming, compared to the competition and previous generation of Intel chips, but if content creation and low energy consumption are important to you, then the little Arrow Lake is worth a look.

The Verdict

70Read our review policyIntel Core Ultra 5 245KThe Core Ultra 5 245K falls short in gaming, compared to the competition and previous generation of Intel chips, but if content creation and low energy consumption are important to you, then the little Arrow Lake is worth a look.

70Read our review policy

Intel Core Ultra 5 245KThe Core Ultra 5 245K falls short in gaming, compared to the competition and previous generation of Intel chips, but if content creation and low energy consumption are important to you, then the little Arrow Lake is worth a look.

Intel Core Ultra 5 245K

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Our Verdict#

Gaming performance#

Content creation performance#

Conclusion#

Our Verdict

Gaming performance

Content creation performance

Conclusion